Opinion
Mismanaging big money: Nicholas Cage fights his manager
by Carl Unegbu, ComedyBeat
This month of February, the action continues in court in Los Angeles where Nicholas Cage, the star of the romantic comedy Moonstruck and former owner of a million-dollar comic book collection, filed a lawsuit last October against his former business manager Samuel J. Levin. Cage has had a lot of money troubles lately, including one from the IRS which hit him up with more than $14 million dollars in back taxes, plus three separate lawsuits claiming millions of dollars from him. And he’s been selling his assets like crazy, including posh homes in Bavaria and Las Vegas.
As it happens, Cage, one of the highest paid movie stars in Hollywood, blames his former business manager for his woes and in his lawsuit he accuses Levin of fraud and mismanagement and seeks damages of more than $20 million dollars from him.
But Levin isn’t laying low either and has fired back with own lawsuit against Cage, where he is asking the court to say he didn’t do anything wrong and for Cage to pay him $129,000 for work he claimed to have done. Levin claims that Cage lived above his means and ignored his advice in the way he spent money. For instance, Levin said that back in 2001 when Cage hired him, he had warned Cage who makes about $20 million per movie that he’d need to make $30 million a year to maintain his lavish lifestyle, which included expensive vacations and the “Gatsby-scale parties” he liked to throw.
Levin got even more specific: he said he warned Cage not to buy the castle in Bavaria and another one in England. He also claimed that in 2007 alone Cage bought $33 million in property, including 22 automobiles. And to demonstrate that he was indeed a good manager, Levin then claimed that early in their working relationship, he did have some luck persuading Cage to sell off a dozen automobiles plus his $1.6 million comic-book collection.
As with most situations like this, allegations are flying in all directions between Cage and Levin and only the court can sort out all this stuff after all the evidence is presented. But on the face of it, and again, only on the face of it, here’s how it kind of looks: First, Levin is a licensed CPA with more than 20 years of experience and has no prior record of complaints from clients. Next, Cage’s lawyers have not come out and specifically denied that Cage ignored Levin’s advice.
So far, Marty Singer, Cage’s lawyer, has only said that it was Levin’s job as business manager to say “no” to his client’s actions. Well, maybe so, but it’s not that simple in the real world, especially with rich celebrity clients who are spending their own money and are not breaking any law by doing so. As Singer himself would already know or perhaps may be about to find out, even lawyers have trouble occasionally getting clients to listen, especially the powerful ones.
But for comedians and other entertainers generally, the big lesson here is also a quite simple one: there are consequences for ignoring expert advice. For starters, the refusal to follow the advice of a professional is usually a good defense for the professional in a lawsuit situation. Especially if they document it right. One common way to document such matters is to prepare what lawyers colloquially call a “C-Y-A” letter (as in “cover-your-ass”) which basically says that advice has been given but refused by the client.
Sometimes, when things get messy, a client’s dirty laundry may also be aired in public. Here, Cage’s lawyers have attacked Levin for sort of making an embarrassing laundry list of Cage’s behavior with money. But did you wonder if they can they punish Levin in any way for outing Cage? Not a chance! And here’s why: the law isn’t going to tie Levin’s hands behind his back when he’s been sued by a former client and his character is under attack. This means he could now use ammunition which in other situations he may not be able to use against a former client.
But the real value of this case is not who wins or loses in the end but what lessons folks in similar situations in the future can learn from this, whether they’re comedians or managers.
Conan the contrarian and his continuing battle for respect
by Carl Unegbu, ComedyBeat
On Sunday, January 10, NBC made it official that it will cancel the 10 p.m. “Jay Leno Show” effective February 12, and move Leno over to an 11:35 p.m. time slot. For Conan O’Brien, NBC said it would offer the funnyman from Harvard the chance to move his “Tonight Show” back just a half hour from 11:35 p.m. to 12:05 a.m. to be followed by Jimmy Fallon’s “Late Show.” Before June 2009, Leno hosted the “Tonight Show” at 11:35 p.m.
Looking back now, the Leno-O’Brien shuffle by NBC Universal’s boss Jeff Zucker easily looks “boneheaded” because, with Leno gone, Letterman now rules the ratings at 11:35 p.m. in spite O’Brien’s best efforts. Plus, Leno himself is doing rather poorly at 10.p.m. and NBC languishes in fourth place among the major networks. This is now being called Late Night Crisis 2010. Disaster all around!
Yet, NBC will not get its wish: O’Brien is leaving in a foul mood with an unfriendly dig at NBC which he accuses of making him a scapegoat for its “terrible” prime time ratings. He also claims that starting the “Tonight Show” at 12:05 a.m. the next day amounts to a “destruction” of the show. O’Brien’s bold reaction somehow recalls an earlier bigger drama on the “Tonight Show” when Jack Paar stormed off the show in 1960 to protest alleged censorship from NBC folks.
When the dust settles, O’Brien will leave NBC with millions of dollars in his pocket. But some people have wondered what the situation would be if the funnyman had chosen to stay and fight instead. No easy answers here but there are options all around the table.
Speaking of O’Brien’s options, a small oversight by his lawyers may have made all the difference, something that NBC has to be thankful for. And here it is: the language of the agreement did not include that O’Brien’s “Tonight Show” must be held at 11:35 p.m. And NBC has ended up using this oversight as an escape route. Recall that NBC told O’Brien he could carry his show intact over to 12:05 a.m.
But if that loophole didn’t exist, O’Brien’s legs would be stronger in a fight against NBC if he had chosen to stick around and mix it up with them. He could easily seek an injunction from a court to prevent NBC from moving Leno to 11:35 p.m. Plus, he could also request an order of specific performance to make NBC keep its word to leave him on at 11:35 p.m. Not having these options made O’Brien something of a sitting duck as NBC selfishly maneuvered to fix Zucker’s earlier big blunder in moving Leno into the 10 p.m. slot. Some have called this tactic Machiavellian.
To be sure, O’Brien isn’t the only one with options here. His contract with NBC reportedly contains what’s called a negative covenant which could allow NBC to keep him off any rival television networks during the time he was supposed to be working for NBC. Already, Zucker is said to be “threatening to ice him” if he walks away from NBC. All this is important because FOX is reportedly interested in hiring O’Brien to launch Fox’s own rival late night show.
But, aside from Fox’s interest in O’Brien, can NBC really enforce any agreement to keep O’Brien off late night television for even one day? Not likely, under the circumstances.
For starters, NBC has not dealt fairly and in good faith with O’Brien and the law requires a party complaining to come with “clean hands.” Plus, the courts would probably find such an action unreasonable since the law aims to protect both competition in the marketplace and a person’s right to earn a living. So, one can safely predict that if push comes to shove here, NBC will likely suffer the same fate that ABC endured in 1980 when ABC failed in its suit against CBS in trying to stop sportscaster Warner Wolf from jumping ship to CBS.
True, O’Brien has asked us not to “feel sorry” for him and considering all the big money he’s leaving with (about $30 million by some estimates), perhaps we shouldn’t. Yet we cannot help but wonder what could have been had the funnyman been in a good position to really take the fight to NBC.
A surprising winner in the late night competition for comedy supremacy
By Carla Baranauckas, ComedyBeat
In the late night television meltdown on NBC, there's one person who is coming out of it all with nothing but upside. Clearly, it’s not Conan O’Brien, even though he may walk away with tens of millions of dollars. And it’s not Jay Leno, despite indications that he may once again be the host of the "Tonight" show. And even David Letterman, whose delight is evident, has plenty to lose if he finds himself in head-to-head competition with Leno, who regularly used to beat him in the ratings.
But, yes, ladies and gentlemen, there is a biggest winner: His name is Tiger Woods.
Almost immediately after the Nov. 27 car crash that ripped open the Woods sex scandal, none of the late night television talk show hosts were pulling their punchlines when it came to the world’s No. 1 golfer. Even Letterman, who revealed earlier in the year his own sexual indiscretions with female staffers, was unrelenting the more that Woods stayed out of sight and the more that the list of women claiming to have had sex with the golfer grew.
Jimmy Fallon quipped on "Late Night": “There was some good news for Tiger today. He was just voted ‘Athlete of the Decade' by The Associated Press. He's also been named ‘Athlete of the Decade’ by Playboy, Penthouse, and Hustler."
And other news events just provided more hooks for Tiger Woods jokes. When the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded, Leno joked: “President Barack Obama accepted the Nobel Peace Prize from the Norwegians. This comes almost two weeks after Tiger Woods was crowned by a Swede."
And during the environment conference in Denmark, Letterman said in his monologue: "But in terms of the temperature, going up and up and up, we are making some progress. Today over there at the conference in Copenhagen, they put a cap on the number of hot girlfriends for Tiger Woods. That's going to cool things off a little bit."
But during the late night upheaval the comedy spotlight has shifted to NBC, Leno and O’Brien.
"NBC has done for Tiger Woods what Al Qaeda did for Congressman Gary Condit: They got both guys who everyone was mocking off the front page by causing an infamous disaster," said Hugh Fink, comedy producer and former head writer for "The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson" on CBS. "The only difference between NBC and Al Qaeda is that even Osama bin Laden wouldn't lower himself by airing ‘The Biggest Loser’—or as I like to call it, 'The Carson Daly Show.'"
Paul Finebaum, sports talk radio host and newspaper columnist based in Birmingham, Ala., sees other factors at play.
"Tiger has benefited for many reasons, but I think the biggest thing going for him is fatigue," Finebaum said. "There was so much, so quickly that the shock value is gone. You could come out with a revelation that Tiger was seeing Halle Berry on the side and people would yawn.
"Sure, he is become a punch line and nobody wants to be compared to him. In fact, three weeks ago, I was on ESPN's 'Outside the Lines' talking about Urban Meyer. I made a reference they were both at the top of their games and within days, both came crashing down. There was outrage from the Florida fans to have their coach compared to Tiger. That was then. Now, with all of the bad news out, sports fan just want to see him on the course again, for better or worse.''
The question remains how long the reprieve for Tiger Woods will last.
On Saturday night while doing his stand-up act at The Mirage in Las Vegas, Leno never mentioned the late night dust-up, John Katsilometes reported on The Las Vegas Sun web site. But Leno did say: "I'm exhausted! I played a foursome today with Tiger Woods!"
And stand-up comedian Adam Sank said his audiences have not tired of Woods jokes.
"Sure, the late night guys have stopped talking about Tiger for the moment," Sank said. "But I'm still getting laughs just mentioning his name in my act—when I say, ‘Dating is tough; it doesn't matter whether you're gay or straight or Tiger Woods.' And remember, Howard Stern is about to host a Tiger Woods mistress beauty pageant on his radio show. So I would say Tiger's not out of the woods yet."
When what makes others laugh can kill you
By Eddie Vega, ComedyBeat
Recently the New York Post’s Mandy Stadtmiller had an insightful interview with troubled comic Artie Lange that took place before Lange plunged a 13-inch kitchen knife into himself nine times. Lange speaks about his struggles with drugs and depression and how he uses it as material for his comedy. His failed and highly publicized suicide attempt now gives his words a sad irony. (Stadtmiller, by the way, does an exemplary job of drawing rich answers with deceptively simple questions.)
While I do not think as many comics suffer regularly from depression and drug abuse as Lange suggests when talking about his comedy heroes, he does identify a relationship between depression and laughter that I think accurate. I’m not referring to the relationship between, say, gallows humor and the nervous laughter it sometimes induces or the idea that if one were not laughing about one’s problems, one would be crying about them, however true. But that sometimes the best material for comedy comes from the dark and tragic moments of one’s own life.
“It’s just about drawing from your life and being original,” Lange related to Stadtmiller. “And my darkness helped my comedy … but to me, and to a lot of comedians depression and comedy go hand in hand.”
Aspiring comic Staff Sergeant Bobby Henline shares that view. Henline, an Iraq War veteran from San Antonio, was dismembered and terribly disfigured by a roadside bomb while traveling in an army convoy. He too counted on comedy to alleviate his pain and aid his emotional healing. Now he uses his hellish experience to make others laugh. As part of his stand-up routine, he tells this joke about what he does on Holloween:
"Halloween is my favorite holiday because I make lots of money at the haunted house. I made $50 laying in my neighbor's yard. I even got a modeling job at the Halloween Super Store."
That’s funny in the most profound way that something can be funny.
Too be sure, good comedians can be wonderfully entertaining and make the time pass quickly. But the very best kind of comedy—from Dante to Shakespeare, and yes to Lange and Henline—is the kind that makes us face our own mortality without masks or false bravado and, for however briefly, allows us to laugh it away.